I wish we could atleast transmute armors of different types. I have an engineer and honeslty most of the nice looking medium armor sets suit the rangers and thieves because they look stealthy. Engineers, I think, are more scholarly and light armor such as these suit engineers more. Seriously, the other one has a chemistry set. Those don't suit magic users.

I like the concept, but no. Being able to ascertain an enemy's profession is an important part of PvP, and this would severely muddy the water.

The waters are already extremely muddied. A tiny Asura in fully black dye would be hard to tell no matter what armor he's wearing. A lot of the dungeon armors don't look their type either. Twilight armor medium when dyed in light colors looks like light armor.

Sorrow's Embrace light/medum/heavy all look similar enough that you would definitely not be able to tell the type at a glance. Some of the dungeon medum armors look more like heavy than the heavy versions, especially on a Charr.

I'm perfectly fine with the way things are. It keeps each general profession type distinct, and there ARE a large variety if styles to pick from among each type. I'll admit that even with that variety there are only a couple that I actually want. But I can't expect ArenaNet to make a whole wardrobe just to please me.

Why would my Mesmer or Elementalist be running around in plat armour? The simple answer is - they wouldn't! Magic is their primary study, not melee combat. They haven't trained to fight in heavy armour for extended periods of time.

What I would like to see is more town clothes. Even "town armour" styles, for those folks who really want to strut around cities and be all shiny.

Asuran technology =/= Charr technology and engineer skills/weapons are much more akin to Charr technology. Asuran technology is far more reliant on magic (hence the CoE, an asuran explorable, light armor looking that way).

Just, please no. It makes no sense thematically, how can something made of cloth protect as well as something made of metal? Not to mention all the confusion it would cause in WvW. If they allowed this they might as well give everyone the same armor rating and remove armor classes in general.

I'm perfectly fine with the way things are. It keeps each general profession type distinct, and there ARE a large variety if styles to pick from among each type. I'll admit that even with that variety there are only a couple that I actually want. But I can't expect ArenaNet to make a whole wardrobe just to please me.

Why would my Mesmer or Elementalist be running around in plat armour? The simple answer is - they wouldn't! Magic is their primary study, not melee combat. They haven't trained to fight in heavy armour for extended periods of time.

What I would like to see is more town clothes. Even "town armour" styles, for those folks who really want to strut around cities and be all shiny.

Mesmers can use greatswords. They'd use magic to reduce the weight of heavy armor if they needed to. There are plenty of explanations if you want to approach this from a 'lore' perspective.

Mesmers can use greatswords. They'd use magic to reduce the weight of heavy armor if they needed to. There are plenty of explanations if you want to approach this from a 'lore' perspective.

How would a lore perspective describe something that looks like plate armor not providing the same armor rating? Not even that, what if your character isn't a mesmer? What kind of thing will a necromancer do to make the weight of heavy armor not overwhelm them? How can you explain cloth armor providing as much protection as plate armor on a warrior? It does not work thematically or logically.

You should be identifying your opponent by 1. the weapon in his hand and 2. the buffs on his person. If neither of those do it immediately, then some attack like BIG PURPLE LASERS gave it away first. You do not need to identify your oppnoent by his armor. Also, you don't transmute sPvP armor, so it wouldn't effect the only balanced pvp anyways.

I would really like to be able to transmute at least some armor models onto different armor types. Thieves really got shafted by the total lack of hoods in medium armor (besides the starter one that matches nothing and the crunchy ugly whispers one). My scholars get tired of always wearing skirts, and want some good pants (not pants with a skirt attached). Heavy armor is just plain poorly modeled until you can get one of 3-4 exotic sets, and my low level warrior would die of happiness to wear anything else.This game has a lot of variety in armor, but only when you count all the armor in the game. When you look at, say, just medium armor for males there is an extremely limited selection to the point of "Do I want a coat with buttons or a coat of buckles?" because that's all the choice you get. Heavy female armor, "Do I want boxy chain or boxy scales?" Light male armor, "Do I want a fruity robe or a demasculated robe?"

Some armors have serious clipping issues with other armor types, like the medium female coats with the light/heavy female skirts. Not being able to combine those is fine. Some other armor is just way too absurd for other armor types, like the winged set's wings/shoulders, and not being able to have those on the other types of armor is also fine.

How would a lore perspective describe something that looks like plate armor not providing the same armor rating? Not even that, what if your character isn't a mesmer? What kind of thing will a necromancer do to make the weight of heavy armor not overwhelm them? How can you explain cloth armor providing as much protection as plate armor on a warrior? It does not work thematically or logically.

Armor appearance is an illusion spell that gives each armor its appearance. How else can you explain bikini heavy armor giving the same protection as full plate heavy armor?

The waters are already extremely muddied. A tiny Asura in fully black dye would be hard to tell no matter what armor he's wearing. A lot of the dungeon armors don't look their type either. Twilight armor medium when dyed in light colors looks like light armor.

Sorrow's Embrace light/medum/heavy all look similar enough that you would definitely not be able to tell the type at a glance. Some of the dungeon medum armors look more like heavy than the heavy versions, especially on a Charr.

Those all fit into making the metagame more complex, though. Someone with a good eye will be able to differentiate those aspects. With armor being the same thing for all classes, you just make that a random aspect and dumb down the metagame. Being good at identifying armor, or being good at hiding armor type with those scenarios you gave, would have no value.

You can make it avaible for PvE only. Who said PvE and PvP have same rules?

Those all fit into making the metagame more complex, though. Someone with a good eye will be able to differentiate those aspects. With armor being the same thing for all classes, you just make that a random aspect and dumb down the metagame. Being good at identifying armor, or being good at hiding armor type with those scenarios you gave, would have no value.

Those are unnecessary complexities that the game can do without. It also gives advantages to playing an Asura as their armor appearance is much harder to identify due to their size. A-net specifically wanted to make sure there were no racial advantages for PvP.

Those all fit into making the metagame more complex, though. Someone with a good eye will be able to differentiate those aspects. With armor being the same thing for all classes, you just make that a random aspect and dumb down the metagame. Being good at identifying armor, or being good at hiding armor type with those scenarios you gave, would have no value.

There are ways to restrict PvE gear to PvE only. We live in 2012 now, Arenanet could easily make gear for WvWvW using the original appearance. It's not really a problem for them. There are probably 10 or more, different solutions.

Those are unnecessary complexities that the game can do without. It also gives advantages to playing an Asura as their armor appearance is much harder to identify due to their size. A-net specifically wanted to make sure there were no racial advantages for PvP.

Actually, they stated they didn't want any significant advantages for WvW; differences, sure. I believe you're talking about sPvP, which isn't an issue since they separate your equipment. Racials wouldn't exist in WvW if they wanted to drill down the differences that small, and an argument can be made that you can use a larger race to your advantage as well (being a meat shield, for example).

I can respect your judgment that the complexity is unnecessary, but I hope you do the same for me. All other things being equal, more complexity is good. It can go too far, but I don't believe anyone's making the accusation that the WvW metagame is too complex.

There are ways to restrict PvE gear to PvE only. We live in 2012 now, Arenanet could easily make gear for WvWvW using the original appearance. It's not really a problem for them. There are probably 10 or more, different solutions.

That's why I stated, they'd have to store two different skins, one to show for WvW, another to show for PvE. That's actually a pretty big change in how the database would look, but I'm not even considering that. I'm talking more about how it would be presented in the interface. Like I stated in post 6, if you can come up with a nice, simple way of conveying that in the interface (that you'd look one way in PvE and another in WvW), go nuts.

Would detract from the essence and diversity of every profession type immensely. Would not like to see this change happen at all because I know it will lead to every single female human playing barbie dress up with an even wider range of barbie clothes.

Did you ever try to combine for example the masquerade skirt and let's say the medium whisper coat ? It can't even be compared to the clipping between a Charr and a shield.

A big hole in almost half the shields in the game (sometimes upwards of 50% of the shield is clipped into the back) on a Charr is a pretty big issue. There's also nothing forcing you to use mixtures that clip.

Actually, they stated they didn't want any significant advantages for WvW; differences, sure. I believe you're talking about sPvP, which isn't an issue since they separate your equipment. Racials wouldn't exist in WvW if they wanted to drill down the differences that small, and an argument can be made that you can use a larger race to your advantage as well (being a meat shield, for example).

I can respect your judgment that the complexity is unnecessary, but I hope you do the same for me. All other things being equal, more complexity is good. It can go too far, but I don't believe anyone's making the accusation that the WvW metagame is too complex.

That's why I stated, they'd have to store two different skins, one to show for WvW, another to show for PvE. That's actually a pretty big change in how the database would look, but I'm not even considering that. I'm talking more about how it would be presented in the interface. Like I stated in post 6, if you can come up with a nice, simple way of conveying that in the interface (that you'd look one way in PvE and another in WvW), go nuts.

There's good complexity and bad complexity. You can add more complexity to the game by hiding all the cooldown timers so players have to memorize when a skill becomes available again, but that really isn't adding any kind of depth to the game. I consider memorizing armor appearances to gain an advantage that kind of complexity, especially since quite a few dye/racial types would completely obfuscate the armor type. Just look at the Sorrow's Embrace armor. Hiding the helm/shoulders and dying it black would pretty much make it nearly impossibly to tell which version is which. There's also a color filter applied to enemy players that make it even harder spot the details on players.